


Bartending Isn't For Everyone

by alecmagnuslwb



Category: Shadowhunters (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Human, F/F, Fluff, clary is a disaster and maia is smitten
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-08
Updated: 2020-08-08
Packaged: 2021-03-06 00:15:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,373
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25784242
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/alecmagnuslwb/pseuds/alecmagnuslwb
Summary: Over the course of eight shifts, Maia’s crush on Clary gets a little stronger and Clary’s skills as a bartender get a lot worse.
Relationships: Clary Fray/Maia Roberts
Kudos: 12





	Bartending Isn't For Everyone

**Author's Note:**

> Writer’s month day 8, prompt: Eight

Clary Fray is an absolutely horrendous bartender. For eight shifts now Maia has watched her do just about everything wrong. She’s seen her make a Manhattan with six olives in it, put whiskey in a coffee mug and call it a whiskey sour, put a balled onion in a margarita and most notably send a round of vodka shots to a table who asked for water.

She narrowly avoided being fired by the manager on day four, but with the help of her little nerdy friend Simon whispering ingredients to her she made a perfect old fashioned and she’d skated by.

Maia should probably just tell her boss what’s going here because she is at the peak of another Friday night rush and she might as well be behind the bar alone with the amount of mistakes Clary keeps making.

There’s just one tiny snag. Maia has developed the biggest crush on this gorgeous girl with one brain cell for bartending.

At first she just thought Clary was pretty and a little dumb if she’s being honest, but then she made the mistake of getting to know her between messed up drink orders. Clary’s not dumb, far from it really, she’s got wit and an artistic mind that sees things in ways no one else can and a ridiculous niche amount of knowledge about mermaid mythology.

Day seven is what really caught her off guard. Still frustrated from watching Clary literally cheat her way through an old-fashioned Maia had decided that she’d put her to the test in a different way with the classic drink slide.

If she broke enough glasses there’s no way this albeit pretty and interesting girl wouldn’t get fired and finally her boss could hire someone that would actually help her out behind the bar.

Maia of course made the mistake of teaching her how to slide a beer down the counter in the most sensual way possible standing behind her and guiding her hand and that’s when she realized she was absolutely fucked.

Clary’s skin was soft and a little chilled to the touch beneath her warm fingers, goosebumps rising with every pass. She could feel the curve of Clary’s back against her front and for a moment her hand accidentally slipped and brushed her hip and Maia was absolutely done for.

Fourteen glasses and five full bottles of beer were broken by the time they cleaned up for the night, but instead of leaving the mess or telling her boss all about how awful Clary was at it Maia made sure there was no evidence of the disaster.

She let her crush dictate her job and right now on night eight of this disaster girl she’s kind of regretting that.

“On the rocks is the one with the ice cubes, right?” Clary asks as Maia attempts to fill two full trays of shots, make a signature margarita and an appletini simultaneously.

Maia just looks at her dumfounded.

“Right, no ice cubes,” Clary says with a determined little nod of her head, it’s cute, Maia wishes it wasn’t cute, because she’s so very wrongly interpreting Maia’s expression.

Maia watches her go about to hand a drink to a patron when she comes to her senses.

“No Clary, with ice. With!” she emphasizes and Clary looks like a deer in the headlights for a moment before getting with the program and grabbing the ice.

It’s a rush of drinks and stopping Clary from putting things that absolutely don’t belong in drinks for almost two full hours after that. When she inexplicably adds a dash of peppermint and orange bitters to a gin and tonic Maia thinks somehow impossibly she’s gotten worse at bartending as the days have passed.

When Jace, Maia’s roommate, comes in after the rush has finally died down and just to be annoying purposefully orders a Negroni, a drink that Maia can barely make, from Clary she snaps.

She pulls the butcher knife from under the bar that they keep for slicing lemons, limes and what not out and lies it on the bar in front of Jace while Clary flutters around with her phone out googling what a Negroni is.

“You are the worst and if you don’t change your drink order right now I will kill you in your sleep tonight,” she whispers quiet and deadly. Jace has known her long enough to know she’s serious so he scrambles quickly to get Clary’s attention switching his drink order to a simple scotch neat.

Clary still manages to mess it up, handing the drink to Jace in a martini glass with a cinnamon stick in it.

“Does she think neat just means that it should look neat?” Jace asks quizzically looking at the drink in front of him.

Maia just opens her mouth and shakes her head unable to form a proper response.

By the time closing hits Maia is exhausted. Eight shifts with Clary and she’s barely survived on two levels, as a bartender and as a bisexual woman with exquisite taste.

Clary’s wiping down the bar, the one bartender task she’s actually quite good at, as Maia flips chairs onto the tables when she finally has to say it.

“No offense Clary, but you know you’re a god-awful bartender right?” she says as she puts up the last chair.

Clary giggles and it’s so cute Maia could scream.

“It’s about time you said it, I was thinking you just didn’t notice or were too nice to bring it up,” Clary says finishing up her wipe down of the bar and leaning on it.

Maia walks over and slips into the stool at the bar in front of where Clary rests.

“Definitely not too nice,” she smirks. “And I definitely noticed, I mean Simon was not subtle that day I don’t know how our boss didn’t catch it. I mean you’re pretty Fray, but there’s a breaking point of distraction even then.”

“Yeah Simon saved my ass that day, but he isn’t known for his subtly,” Clary laughs and then pauses. “Wait did you just say I’m pretty?”

Maia smiles and nods.

“I did. You are.”

Clary blushes just a little her pale skin taking on a pink highlight as she fiddles with the rag in her hand.

“So if you know you’re that bad why haven’t you quit yet?” Maia asks watching the way Clary’s fingers twist the rag around and around.

Clary shrugs leaning in a little more on the bar. “Maybe I was just waiting for the pretty bartender to either ask me out or get me fired?”

Maia smiles.

“Can I do both? Is both an option?” she says leaning in a little more too.

Clary laughs, full out belly laughs at that and pulls back from the bar.

“How about you ask me out and let me quit?” she counteroffers when she gets her laughter under control. “I found a job at an art store a few blocks away, definitely more suited to me, but I can’t start till next week and I kinda need the paycheck from here.”

Maia rolls her eyes and sighs faking annoyance, well slightly faking as much as she likes Clary the idea of one more week of this is a tasking thing to have to deal with.

“Fine, I guess I can survive one more week of you not knowing the difference between bourbon and whiskey,” Maia says with a teasing smile.

“They’re the same thing!” Clary exclaims tossing her hands up in the air.

“If you said that to someone from the right region they’d hit you over the head with a bottle of one. Though the differences are subtle they are very real,” Maia says switching gears as she sees Clary about to argue that’s not the case. They’ve had this argument once before already. “So, you want to get dinner with me next Friday after you’ve officially quit?”

“Why wait till Friday?” Clary asks.

“Because I can’t in good confidence date you until I know I never have to watch you butcher another drink again,” Maia says with a twist of her lips.

“Rude,” Clary grumbles with a smile. “But fair. I can’t wait till’ Friday then.”

“Neither can I.”

**Author's Note:**

> tumblr: [alecmagnuslwb](https://alecmagnuslwb.tumblr.com/)


End file.
